Now that spring’s officially here, it’s time to get your body and skin prepped for sunny days ahead. This is the key moment of the year to support your body’s detox processes, ensuring that your energy soars, your skin glows, and your body naturally lets go of any winter weight that you’ve been carrying. Spring detox can be an annual ritual that’s refreshing and delicious—no juice cleanse necessary.

If you’ve followed along with this series so far, you’ve already added more green foods to your spring meals, and tapped into a powerful detox ritual using hot water. Keep those practices going in the weeks ahead! This week, we look at the foods that can hold you back from detoxing optimally, from pesticide-sprayed produce to foods that contain BPA and sugar. My clients are focusing on these very same spring strategies, so consider this your free health coach check-in, and be sure to check back in the weeks ahead. The goal, as always, is to get you looking and feeling your best this season, from the inside out.

Week 3: Paring Down

Now that you’ve supercharged your spring meals with key foods to support your body’s natural detox pathways, you can continue to further the process by reducing your intake of the foods that either interfere with detox or introduce additional toxins into your body. I don’t recommend that you push yourself toward a strict, complete elimination of these foods, rather that you make a conscious effort to reduce them significantly, using your goal of looking and feeling your best this spring as motivation. At the top of the list of foods to pare down on is sugar, as it creates inflammation in the body, suppresses your immune system (which is working to support you as you detox), and leaves your skin prone to blemishes, redness, and premature wrinkles. Cutting your sugar intake can make dramatic improvements to the way you look and feel this spring and beyond. I recommend that you set a goal to get your sweetness from whole foods (like the recipe below, which uses dried cherries to sweeten) rather than added sugar. Other key foods to avoid as your body detoxes this spring are pesticide-sprayed produce and foods from cans or plastics that contain BPA, both of which introduce additional toxins into your body while you are trying to remove them. Some of the most important foods to buy organic are strawberries, apples, peppers, and spinach, simply because they are sprayed with the highest levels of pesticides.

This week, and throughout the spring, try to reduce sugar, pesticide-sprayed foods, and BPA in your diet, and watch your energy soar and your skin glow as the weeks go by. To read through a more in-depth list of foods to reduce or eliminate this spring, check out the Beauty Betrayers list in Eat Pretty.

Sweet C Bites

These delicious bites conquer sugar cravings with a sweet combination of cherries, chia, and coconut—but no added sweeteners. Chia seeds further your spring detox, while coconut nourishes supple skin. Keep them in the fridge for a perfect spring snack.

Makes 12

Ingredients

Heaping ¼ cup dried cherries (look for unsweetened)

2 tbsp chia seeds

½ cup warm or room temperature water

1 cup unsweetened, finely shredded coconut flakes

½ tsp vanilla extract

¼ tsp almond extract

Pinch of unrefined salt

Method

In a small bowl, combine dried cherries, chia seeds and water. Set aside for at least 15 minutes to allow the cherries to soften and the chia seeds to gel.

In a high-powered blender or food processor, blend cherry-chia-water mixture, about one-third of the coconut flakes, vanilla and almond extracts, and a pinch of sea salt, until the mixture comes together and the cherries have broken down into tiny pieces. Return the mixture to the bowl and stir in the remaining coconut flakes. Roll into 1-inch balls and chill until ready to serve.

Jolene Hart, CHC, AADP is a Philadelphia-based health coach and founder of Beauty Is Wellness, a natural beauty and health coaching practice. Her coaching and Eat Pretty book series teach women to use nutrition and lifestyle choices to look and feel their best from the inside out.